NH fire department’s request for new truck denied

Current vehicle is 20 years old and has been scheduled for replacement for a while

March 13, 2011 11:59 AM

The Concord Monitor

LOUDON, N.H. — The fate of a 20-year-old pumper truck for the Loudon Fire Department caused a heated debate at the town meeting yesterday.

Nearly 225 people convened in the Loudon Elementary School gymnasium for three hours to discuss 11 articles. They rejected spending $375,000 from a reserve fund to buy new pumper truck but approved a $4.04 million operating budget and $560,000 for capital reserve funds and expendable trust funds.

The pumper truck request was the only warrant article to fail.

The truck is 20 years old and has been scheduled for replacement for a while, fire Chief Jeffrey Burr said. The fire department added the article by petition, but it was not supported by the selectmen.

“We’ve had a ladder truck that’s been nickel-and-diming us for years,” Selectman Steven Ives said.

The ladder truck is 30 years old, and will cost $1 million to replace in a few years, Ives said, adding that spending $375,000 on a pumper truck this year will make it difficult to make that purchase without significant tax increases because the reserve fund will be depleted.

Full-time firefighter William Lake disagreed. While the ladder truck is in good working condition, the pumper truck is in need of more serious attention, Lake told voters.

“It does not pump at capacity,” Lake said. He said that it should be able to pump 1,200 gallons per minute, but because of age and use, it can now only pump 900 gallons per minute.

According to Burr, the pumper truck is used throughout an attack on a fire. A ladder truck is used to reach tall barns and chimneys to help ventilate buildings. Loudon’s current ladder track was in used condition when it was donated by New Hampshire Motor Speedway more than 15 years ago, Burr said.

Brad Weilbrenner, who works for the state’s Bureau of Emergency Medical Services but not for the Loudon Fire Department, urged residents to trust the chief’s decisions about what equipment is most in need of replacing.

It would be unfair to ask firefighters, many of them volunteers, to put their lives on the line only to have a piece of equipment fail, Weilbrenner said, adding that “it could be your family that may need that piece of equipment.”

The article was defeated 174-48, with the vote taken by secret ballot by order of the moderator after a lengthy, emotional debate.

However, residents did not completely deny the ailing pumper truck. An amendment suggested by Ives that increased the town’s operating budget by $15,000 - the cost estimated to repair just the faulty pump on the truck - easily passed.

East Ricker Road and Staniels Road will be repaved thanks to approval of an article to spend $90,000 from an existing fund combined with $70,000 to be raised in taxes.

A fund to save money for the costs of the town’s biannual hazardous waste collection day was also established, with an initial contribution of $10,000.

According to Ives, increased spending from the warrant articles was added to a budget that was 5 percent lower than the one voters approved last year. If the selectmen’s predictions about revenue are accurate, the town tax rate should remain roughly the same.